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Make Your Own Aging Hippie Healing Salve
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The ability to make beauty and personal care type items from natural herbs, flowers, and garden vegetables, goes back to at least the ancient Egyptian. They tell of stories in which women anointed their bodies with perfumed oils, made by heating and steeping flowers and herbs, such as jasmine and rosemary, in olive oil, safflower oil, and almond oil. The ancient Greeks were the ones who came up with the first cold cream and they believed that herbal cosmetics would not only make you smell better, but feel better as a result.
The always pleasure seeking Romans loved their fragrant baths and steam rooms and spent a great deal of time soaking in flower and oil scented waters. During the miserable Middle Ages, perfumes of violets and jasmine were created to help cheer people up and it was found that adding honey to chamomile tea could help to improve a person’s complexion.
You might remember your grandmother or great-grandmother saving flowers, leaves, and roots and storing them in the cellar. During the winter months, she would pull out some of those dried summer flowers and make a tea or syrup for you when you had a cold or a nasty cough. Perhaps she made her own shampoo or special cream to lighten age spots.
You can continue this tradition and create your own herbal shampoos, facials, moisturizers, body oils, perfumes, lotions, and hair rinses from your own garden or from wild plants you can harvest from meadows and forests. Doing so takes no more time than it would to cook breakfast and not only will know exactly what is in the product you are using, you can save a small fortune and perhaps even have a little fun while doing it.
There are numerous recipes online that can tell you which herbs and flowers are best for certain problems such as dry skin or itchy scalp, but this article is going to tell you how you can make your own antiseptic herbal salve that is loaded with valuable germ killing compounds that is sure to help all of those who feel as if we have a little bit of hippie in our soul. Since the hippie era went by the wayside about 40 years ago, we are going to christen this ointment “Aging Hippie Healing Salve,” but you don’t need to be an old hippie to appreciate this ointment.
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Use this salve the same way you would those toxic laden commercially prepared antibiotic ointments you can buy in any drugstore.
The nice thing about this salve is that not only can you save money by making it yourself, but it’s loaded with tons of anti-viral, anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-microbial, and analgesic compounds that can heal:
- Cold sores
- Itchy skin
- Rashes
- Eczema
- Bug bites or insect stings
- Minor burns
- Psoriasis
- Slow healing cuts or wounds
- Topical thrush
- Inflammation
- Sinus congestion/colds
- Bruises
This ointment has some of the most soothing, healing, yet gently restorative compounds you can find in nature.
Here are the herbs that we are going to use in this salve; note that all of the following herbs are going to be used in their dried form:
v Calendula Flowers: Terrific for healing any type of skin ailment. These flowers contain powerful phytochemicals that fight fungi, viruses, and bacteria.
v Plantain: A very common weed that grows everywhere! Don’t let its availability fool you; this plant can stop poison ivy, bee stings, psoriasis and eczema.
v St. John’s Wort: Most often thought of as a natural anti-depressant, this herb is excellent for treating brushes, cuts, and sunburns when applied topically.
v Goldenseal Root: This plant has been severely overharvested, so please buy organic rather than harvest it wild. This root has some of the most antimicrobial, antibiotic, anti-viral, and anti-bacterial compounds.
v Olive Leaf: Perhaps the most powerful anti-viral herb on the planet.
v Comfrey Root and Leaves: This herb is super soothing to the skin and stimulates the body to create more cells. This supports the speedy healing of bruises, swelling, burns, and sores.
v Pine Resin: Used by Native Americans for ages to help seal and heal wounds. The resin from pine trees has incredible healing compounds. Pine resin might be a little hard to come by in most health food stores, but you can easily buy it online.
You will also need some beeswax and raw, organic honey.
Ready to get going? Collect your ingredients and let’s get started!
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Photo credit: bigstock.com
Aging Hippie Healing Salve
Ingredients
- 4 Tablespoons (about 2 ounces) of beeswax
- 2 Teaspoons of the essential oils of your choice (for scent) optional
- 1.25 Cups of virgin olive oil
- 1 Tablespoon each of the dried olive leaf, dried calendula flowers, dried St. John’s Wort, dried comfrey roots and leaves, dried goldenseal root, dried plantain, and the pine resin. You can add a little more of some and less of another depending on what you have on hand or what is available in your area. You need about 2/3 of a cup of dried botanicals.
- 1 Tablespoon of raw, organic honey
- ½ Teaspoon of vitamin E oil ( you can break open a capsule or two and squeeze it out)
Essential oils are terrific for adding not only some lovely scent, but for their antiseptic compounds. Some of the best for this purpose would be tea tree, lavender, rosemary, lemon, cinnamon, and/or thyme. You can mix and match or just use your favorite scent or none at all, this is an optional ingredient but you will really feel good about using this salve if it’s as pleasing to your nose as it is to your skin.
Instructions:
- Prepare your oil infusion by placing your dried herbs in a Mason jar and cover them with the oil. Stir and then place the jar in a saucepan on your stove, or in a crockpot that has a few inches of water in it. (Put a washcloth on the bottom of the pot to be sure the glass does not get too hot.) Heat for 4 to 8 hours, or overnight. (Crockpots are great for this!)
- Once the mixture cools, strain out the herbs using a cheesecloth, being sure you squeeze the cloth to get out every drop. You will need at least one cup of oil when you are done.
- Over very low heat, melt the beeswax into the herbal oil mixture. Once it is melted, remove from heat.
- Allow this mixture to cool to about 100 degrees, and then add in your raw honey, essential oils (if you are using them) and the vitamin E oil. Whisk together until the mixture is creamy and smooth.
- Spoon the mixture into your chosen containers. If kept sealed and stored in a cool, dark place, this ointment should last for about 2 years!
SEE ALSO: 5 Super Healthy and Healing Smoothie and Tonic Recipes
You probably never imagined that something so soothing and healing could be so easy to make! Double your recipe and make some gifts for your other hippie friends!
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